When inspirations strike and opinions form, and when heartfelt joys fill the moments.

Thursday, November 4, 2010

Japan Great Value Shopping Buys - Ichi

The great thing about Japan is their toiletries shops! Being a bigger fan of skincare than fashion, I was thrilled to explore the many shops scattered around their cities. With so many interesting options and brands, the Japanese consumers are really spoilt for choices.

It's a known fact that the Japanese consumers are very particular about their beauty products and regime. This gave me confidence to try out any items that caught my eyes. Moreover, the products are all made in Japan which is really value for money!

Bf must have been a little sick of toiletries shopping but maintained his patience throughout. In the end, even he was convinced and bought himself a few pack of eye masks back home. The bottom left eye mask is really effective! His eye rings lightened and wrinkles smoothened out quite a bit.

The baby packaging mask in the middle is really moisturizing; better than SKII in my opinion, and cost less than 10SGD for a pack of 5.

We found the masks that came packaged like wet tissue (like the bottom left and bottom middle ones) even more value for money and bought a few packs for gifts. The co-enzyme Q10 ones in orange packaging by KOSE are really effective and there was a customer that bought 10 packs at one go!

I finally got to try the much acclaimed Habo Labo hydrating toner at less than 800yen / 12.80SGD. I was told the green one is meant for combination skin and it is really moisturizing for Japan's cool weather and non-sticky for Singapore's one.

By the way, this one with the green wordings is the lighter version for combination skin. It's not available in Singapore yet. For new users, you may want to buy this in Japan instead of Singapore whereby you can only get the orange wordings one, which is more hydrating and may cause breakouts. :|

Besides these, we found the leather products really worth buying too. The pink card holder cost me 1000yen/ 16SGD. It may not be a Japanese made product but the quality is really good and it's made of genuine leather. And if you inform the departmental staff that it is a gift, they'll even gift wrap for free!

I really love the design of the blue wallet above too and it came in such a lovely colour!

Best of all, we managed to find the shoes bf wanted for less than 80SGD a pair!

He got some chic ties at less than 10SGD each too.

And if you're into brands, get on a train to Rinku Town in Osaka, the premium outlets. We got the Nike sneakers and toddler's ones at 3360yen / 53.80SGD and 1680yen / 26.90SGD respectively.

See how happy Clara is with her new sneakers.

In Tokyo, there's this fashion accessories shop at Harajuku that sells really pretty and inexpensive accessories called Before The Bloom. It's facing the North or Takeshita exit of JR Harajuku station and situated quite close to the one end of the popular Takeshita Dori.

I got myself these 2 beautiful necklaces that carry the exquisite dainty Japanese style.

And of course, we drank and ate our way through the cities. The beer was cheap, the sashimi and vegetable was fresh, the mood was loving and everything tasted yummy!

Asahi Clear is really light and refreshing.

Suntory Rich Malt tastes full-flavored like its name and leaves a lasting malt taste.

We only drank Yebisu in restaurants and it tasted like a mix of the 2 beers above even though it's a all malt beer.

The sake flavours are varied too and the warm ones are great accompaniment to meals.

The sashimi from the supermarket is very fresh and we had them almost every night. Sometimes from restaurants.

We were lucky that Dotonbori Hotel, the hotel we were staying in Osaka provides a microwave oven on every floor and is located very near to a food market / supermarket; a great place to grab discounted meal from 8pm or 9pm onwards. Even though it's cheap TV meal, it was totally delicious and enjoyable.